Ironic processing is the psychological process whereby an individual’s deliberate attempts to suppress or avoid certain thoughts (thought suppression) render those thoughts more persistent. A classic example is Fyodor Dostoevsky's quote from Winter notes on summer impressions: “Try to pose for yourself this task: not to think of a polar bear, and you will see that the cursed thing will come to mind every minute.” Ironic process theory (Wegner, 1992, 1994) has two opposing mechanisms (Dual Process Model of social cognition): The first unconsciously and automatically monitors for occurrences (monitoring processes) of the unwanted thought, calling upon the second (operating processes) should the thought begin to intrude. This theory explains the effects of increased cognitive load by emphasizing that where there is cognitive effort, the monitoring process may supplant the conscious process, also suggesting that in order for thought suppression to be effective, a balance between the two processes with the cognitive demand not being too great as to let the monitoring process supersede it must exist.

As recent research suggests (e.g. Geraerts et al., in press) there may be an important role of individual differences that may be able to account for this. Although in certain domains, such as memorization, it appears that ironic effects of attempting to remember vary with the level of mental control over mnemonic processing and may be due simply to implementation of ineffective mental strategies. The phenomenon has been identified through thought suppression studies in experimental psychology.

Social psychologist Daniel Wegner and his colleagues first studied thought suppression in a laboratory setting in 1987 by instructing participants to avoid all thoughts of a white bear. The typical finding in such experiments is that suppressing thoughts of a white bear causes the frequent return of such thoughts, sometimes even yielding a tendency to obsess about the very thought that is being suppressed. The implications for these findings have since been applied in clinical settings where thought suppression is quite common (e.g., trying not to think of one's problems or other anxiety-producing or depressing thoughts).

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